Meet globetrotter David Ballington from London’s Jewish Community Centre

South Africans do great things in London. David Ballington went from managing comedians to working as the Duty Manager at the Jewish Community Centre

Those who visit the renowned Jewish Community Centre in London, also known as JW3,will probably run into the centre’s duty manager, David Ballington. Originally from South Africa, Mr Ballington regularly goes above and beyond the call of duty to make visitors welcome, including once spending an entire evening pushing a blind skater around the temporary ice rink.

His journey from Bartletts to working at the Jewish Community Centre is a fascinating one.Born in Bartletts, a small agricultural area outside of Johannesburg, in 1970, Mr Ballington left South Africa in 1994. “Those were exciting times for South Africa with a lot of political change was happening…”, he says. “I’ve been back since and although the country’s the same, the social atmosphere is very different.”

Did the struggle affect you personally?

“Well, I grew up on a farm and it was very insular. You couldn’t even see your nearest neighbour and because of South Africa’s social structure, you didn’t initially realise anything [was] amiss. But as I became more aware of society around me, I began to realise that something was seriously wrong with the way society was organized. [One time on a holiday] in Greece, I was chatting with another tourist. We were chatting quite amicably until she asked me where I was from. Upon my reply, she said, “Oh I’m from South Africa,” and she got up and walked away.“There was a lot of international protest regarding white South Africans at the time. There was a lot of animosity towards us because the political situation was obviously wrong.”

Why did you leave South Africa?

“Initially, I went to Amsterdam. I had a school friend who was living in Amsterdam who suggested I come stay there. Two weeks later, I packed up and enjoyed it so much I stayed for eight years. I did lots of different jobs but one was working for a company called ‘Radical Re-housing’ [which was] producing a lot of DJ’s who were in the dance scene. They put together lots of different dance events, record launches and DJ events. It was great fun!“Then I moved to Belgium and worked as a PA for an American stockbroker, and then to France where I worked in live entertainment… And then I moved to the UK. At first, I worked in Dingwalls, a live music venue in the heart of Camden, with live music, lots of different acts and comedians. I got into doing a lot of work with comedians, which I really enjoyed, and became a show manager for jongleurs comedy. I still do the occasional show with them which is really great fun!”

Wasn’t JW3 a bit too different following that?

“Not at all! JW3’s very diverse and there’s always something different going on. There’s everything from live music, comedy, live theater…this place never stops. It adds a new dimension to what I was doing before. This place has the theater, social and learning aspect. It’s a fantastic environment that is absolutely beautiful.”

Do you meet many South African expats?

“Funnily enough, I’ve met [the] most South African expats since being in London here at JW3. Of course, I’ve met fellow South Africans before and I’ve had family members over. But my biggest contact with South Africans has been here, and that’s really weird.”

Why is that?

“There was and still is a large Jewish community in South Africa. A lot of people from that community have British or European roots and when things changed politically in South Africa, they moved to London. And naturally the came to the community centre.”

So are you Jewish or South African first?

“Well it’s a duality I suppose. There’s a large Jewish aspect in South Africa and a large Jewish community there. But the religious aspect has never been the principal aspect of my life, my family are very free.”

Have you experienced the stigma some Jews say South Africans attach to them because of the State of Israel?

“Not really. I’ve always been fairly liberal in my thinking, and as far back as I can remember the Jewish community in South Africa was always extremely liberal with their political views. They were very much on the left and extremely sympathetic to people who were subjected, and I’m afraid that I am shockingly apolitical.”

How has South Africa changed while you’ve been away?

“There’s been a lot of progress and a lot of building. For example in Bartletts, you couldn’t see anything for miles when I grew up, and now there are housing developments and even a shopping centre. I don’t recognise the area I grew up in. And the feel of people in the streets is different. There are two sectors in the population now. You’ve got the older generation who grew up under Apartheid and know the struggle, and then you’ve got the younger generation who’ve never known that and only know about it from history books. They’re known as the ‘born free’ and they’ve got a far more relaxed attitude to life, which is fantastic to see as that will engender a harmonious, united future for the country.”

So are complaints of a high crime rate and corruption too pessimistic?

“It’s a pessimistic view of the country, but in many respects it’s true. A huge sector of the population, black and white, have nothing – no money [and] no prospects – and the natural migration towards crime high crime rates come from that.”

Will you go home in the future to help fix this?

“No. I’m enjoying London, I have a Scottish heritage, my family are Scots and I don’t envisage going back to live in South Africa in the near future. I love living in London, and I love what I do here.”

You’re unmarried now, but if you have a family would you want them to know South Africa?

“Absolutely! When you look at the country, the Cape and the coastline, it’s absolutely stunning. I would like my future family to experience that, but I would choose to stay in the UK.”

The JW3 building is as interesting as the people who visit it

The JW3 is a new award-winning community centre to serve the Jewish population in London. The centre includes a café, auditorium and screening room, classrooms, exercise rooms, a nursery and offices for the organization itself. All these facilities are accommodated in a flexible three-storey pavilion set away from the busy Finchley Road that runs along the east side of the site, creating an intimate, sheltered outdoor space that allows the building and its occupants to literally breathe.

JW3 aims to bring together the organisation’s many and diverse activities into a single building – a meeting point for Jews and non-Jews alike. The building is culture driven, and its schedule incorporates both user requirements and a long- and short-term events.

To accommodate its wide-ranging activities, the building has been designed as a pavilion with a high degree of flexibility. A room that hosts a dance class for 40 people in the morning may need to be used for an intimate book group of just ten people later that day. The JW3 is designed to be a place of action – of creation and output, rather than consumption of culture – and robust, quality materials have been chosen to support the various activities, from a crèche for 75 children to a cinema, demonstration kitchen and dance studios. A multi-purpose hall with retractable bleacher seating and semi-sprung floor provides event space for 300 guests at seated events, and the theatre and auditorium supports performance types such as dance, spoken word and theatre.

Locating the services to the rear has resulted in a level of flexibility on each floor, through devices such as folding walls or simply by leaving large flexible spaces open – allowing lighting and soft architecture to define the use and time. The pavilion articulates the front of the building, providing privacy for the residents behind and a conversation between the activities ongoing in the building and those in the courtyard.

Simple but effective chimneys provide ventilation and permit-free night cooling and the positioning of windows primarily on the piazza elevation controls heat gain and encourages inside/outside permeability. The floor plates and core are arranged to optimise flexibility so that each space can be used for a multitude of activities according to the centre’s own programming. The building has been designed to be easy to navigate, accessible to all, and very environmentally-friendly, with natural ventilation, a brown roof to encourage biodiversity, rainwater harvesting and solar panels. JW3 achieved a BREEAM excellent rating.